A modification of the "buy the heals" thing is that the medic can load up players with n (say 1...4?) 1-shot healing cartridges like the Patriarch uses. He can carry 4. One use and toss, again like Pat. The 1-shots are dispensed when the medic is near, like plain healing. The medic should get points (AND MONEY) for healing done with the 1-shots as if she had done it directly. Medics can still use their syringe from EverFull, Inc. pretty much as is. We can have the 1-shots heal much more damage than a self heal.
More healing, limited amount, a good medic can dispense more.
The 1-shots can be bought at the trader for use when no medics are around. But only up to the max the medic can give.
What I don't like too much is making the medic (or any perk) a necessity for a team to be successful. If a team is so dependent on any perk that it can't function w/o it then something's wrong.
I do like the idea of making the medic heals significantly better, but not by lowering a non-medic's ability to heal too much. People do get cut off from the group and need to heal themselves. And it's nice to top off when you see a FP in the distance.
Now, to go off the deep end.
These are some wild ideas to try to get us thinking out of the bandaid box.
I think this would be fun, but will never get in:
Medics can shoot healing darts into teammates (this requires a skill other than poking when near someone.) It allows a medic to dispense healing to a team much faster, IF the healer is good. The fired syringes level up like the EverFull. Maybe there can be location dependent healing: buttock + 20%, head -10%, jugular + 77.3%
And he can perhaps shoot poison into zeds. This may be as powerful as, say, a shotgun blast, but the damage accrues over time, kinda like a burning zed. Again, skill is needed and decent damage is available.
It would also be cool (but will never happen) to be able to fire different poisons: one makes it turn on its fellows. One just kills. One can paralyze. Burst into flames. Stop killing and start knitting or doing needle point. What ever makes sense.
Just goofy ideas. I'm not trying to change the nature of the game at all, just trying to think about things differently.
Way crazy, but since stuff is beginning to come out of Horzine (welders and what not), perhaps some tech will too. Just how do the stalkers cloak? Perhaps a medic can buy ampoules for the EverFull for cloaks. Maybe 1,2 or 3 are ok per wave, but more can kill (random).
More injectable oddities, based on Specimen abilities: speed like a gorefast, strength (boost berserker dmg), jump like a crawler. Scream, etc.
These could all have the "few ok, many dangerous" mechanic. Maybe an OD turns you into the zed who's powers you are using.
Just a joke: grow blades, chainsaws or meat grinders.
Maybe the medic can surgically remove the gorefast blade (katana damage?) or chainsaws.
I do like the 1-shot cartridge idea, tho.
Destructive critisim is useless since these are all just products of my meds kicking in. Primarily the Namenda.
Constructive criticism is more than welcome.
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